Background
Panafrica Publishers is the result of the collaboration between Malawian writer Shadreck Chikoti and Danish writer Trine Andersen who met at a writers conference in Stockholm, Sweden. Here they were discussing some of the various problems that African writers face today.
One crucial difficulty is that only a few publishing companies exist on the African continent. To have your books out as an african writer you must go through a European publishers house. Unfortunately European publishers have a tendency to favour books that suit a European idea of what is authentically African. Also, these books seldom return to an African market. The african readers therefore are prevented from reading their own writers.
This is what Panafrica Publishers wants to change.
Today Shadreck Chikoti is the leader of Panafrica Publishers, situated in Lilongwe, Malawi.
Trine Andersen functions as fundraiser and founder of the association A Read in Copenhagen, Denmark. The sole purpose of A Read is to support Panafrica Publishers.
Sunday, January 25, 2009, trine